Through hurt and pain
by lupin55
Summary: Tonks watches Remus change during HBP and struggles to come to terms with his underground mission. Will things ever return to how they once were? Can things ever be the same after a year of hurt?
1. A heart broken

I watch you as you sit there, in the corner, alone. You look more tired, worn, and I immediately know that there is something wrong. I know you have been down since Sirius died, and rightly so, but I can tell that this is different.

You look up and catch me staring, so I offer you a smile, which you do not return. Slowly I walk over to you, your gaze locked with mine. There is something in your eyes that I cannot quite make out and as I sit down beside you I notice what seems like tear tracks down your cheeks.

Slowly you turn away and just as I am about to ask you what's wrong you begin to speak.

"Dumbledore has assigned me a mission". Your voice is quiet, strained, and I struggle to hear what your saying.

"What sort of mission? Where?"

"I am to go underground as a spy" I struggle to comprehend what it is you are saying and then it hits me – you are going to spy on the werewolves.

"Underground...you mean with...No...Remus" I plead, my voice quivering.

You turn to face me and look me in the eye. I know then that you are going and nothing that I say will stop you. There is something determined about the way your jaw is set and I can't help but think that there is a bigger reason for you leaving than that which you are letting on.

"Its because of Sirius isn't it?" I blurt out and you raise your head in reply.

"No Dora. Its because I am the only person capable of doing this"

"That's bull and you know it. Ever since he died you've been looking for a reason to get yourself killed and now you've been handed the perfect opportunity. You feel guilty, so instead of sitting down and talking about it like anyone else, you decide to punish yourself!" I yell my insides raging with anger and disbelief.

"That's not true!" You say, your voice only slightly raised and your calm demeanour still evident.

"Yes it is! I know you Remus, maybe not as well as h e did but I know you! Are you really willing to give that up? To give us up?" My voice is quivering now and I struggle to fight down the tears I feel welling inside me.

"This is the way it has to be!" You shout. I am so shocked to hear you with your voice raised that I stare at you in silence. You seem to realise what you have done because the next time you speak your voice is back to its usual volume.

"Look, Nymphadora, I have to take this mission. I am the only person who can and I will not let Dumbledore down. I owe it to him. And I am sorry, I truly am, that we must end things like this but we must! The last few weeks have shown me that everyone I care about ends up dead and I refuse to put you in danger. I have lost enough people and somehow I have survived, but losing you...well I wouldn't survive that Dora, so please don't ask me to try." As you finish what you are saying I see tears in your eyes. You stand and turn to walk away and I look after you, stunned to silence by what you have revealed. Never in all the time I have known you have I seen you speak so openly about the losses you have suffered and I now know what it was I saw in your eyes a few minutes ago. I saw pain. Pain for the past and all you have lost, and pain for what you are still to lose. I saw anger at being asked to live the life you have fought endlessly to stay away from. I saw fear for those remaining whom you care for more than you dare admit, and I saw love. I saw love for all those whom you have lost. I saw love for Harry, your final link to your past. I saw love for the man that gave you the life you had today. And lastly, I saw love for me.

**_Please review. Next chapter should be up in a few days._**


	2. We need one another

It has now been two months since that day and as I look at you across the room I realise just how hard the last few weeks must have been for you. There are new scars on your face and I can't prevent my mind from wondering how the rest of your body may have changed. Looking over you I can see, even from this distance, that your clothes are baggier than I have ever seen them before. You've lost weight and it scares me. If you have changed this much over a couple of months, how much will you have changed by the time this is done? Will you even live to see the end?

You sit there in silence, staring with a blank gaze at the table, and I see that it is not just your body that is being broken. Your mind is also slowly being destroyed. Your once cheery manner has gone and you no longer fill the awkward silences with a random question or interesting fact. Instead you just sit there, avoiding the gazes of the people surrounding you and ignoring me.

After what seems like an eternity Dumbledore enters and the room falls into silence. As his eyes search the room I notice that his gaze lingers on you and I wonder if he thinks he has made a mistake in sending you on this mission. I hope he does. I hate him for this - for sending you away to live among the kind you have tried so hard to rebel against and to what could very easily lead to your death.

He addresses us and then asks you for your report. As you speak I am shocked to find that your voice is quieter and you avoid making eye contact with anyone, even me. I see too that your hand is shaking slightly and I wonder if it is due to nerves or whether you are trying to repress another, deeper emotion. I notice that you do not stand as you once did to address the Order and this scares me as well. You have withdrawn so far into yourself that it is hard to find the Remus who I know in the broken shell that sits before me – the Remus who I love.

When you finish your report Dumbledore calls you aside and leads you to another room. I don't see you again that night but as I get ready for bed you are all that is on my mind and as I close my eyes I wonder if you are thinking of me as I am of you. I wonder if you dream about me, about us. And I wonder if you will ever realise that we need one another more than either one of us dare admit.


	3. Flame of hope

As I hear the knocking on the door I immediately know it is you. I can sense it. I slowly make my way to the door wondering why it is you are here and how much more you will have changed. My hand grasps the handle and I take a deep breath, realising that I am more scared of this meeting than I dare admit. I open the door and see you, standing there with snow in your hair and a bag that I know will contain a hand knit jumper from Molly. Your eyes are locked with mine and your gaze is intense. It is as though this is the first time you have looked at someone so closely in a long time and I think to myself that maybe it is.

"Molly mentioned that you might be spending Christmas alone..." your voice is quiet and hoarse and it sounds as though you have a cold. I cannot help the worry that forms in my chest at this thought and I fight to push the tears that are fighting their way to the surface back down. As I search for something to say I find that for now my words are lost, so instead I step aside and signal for you to come in. As you slowly move past me I cannot help but watch you and I am pained to see that you hunch over slightly as you walk. I notice too that you have a slight limp and I find myself wondering just how you got it and what other wounds you bear.

Once in my messy living room you turn to face me and your gaze locks with mine. I find myself lost in the depths of your amber eyes. They seem colder than before somehow and this pains me. To me your eyes used to be the doorway through which I saw how you truly felt. You always had strong barriers surrounding you and your eyes were the window to your heart for me. It was through them that I could see exactly how you felt no matter how much you tried to hide it, but now...now I see nothing but darkness.

"I didn't want to see you" The words leave my mouth before I even realise I have said them. You raise your head slightly as though shocked at my being so open. Silence surrounds us and we do nothing but stare at one another, neither knowing what to say. After what seems like hours, but really could not be more than minutes, you take a step towards me and I instinctively move towards you. As I feel your arms enclose around me I feel my body shudder at the contact it has so long desired. You pull me in to your body and I rest my head on your shoulder. It feels far more bony than it used to and as I wrap my arms around you I notice that I can feel your ribs jutting out too. This is too much for me and I feel my tears start to fall, landing softly on your shoulder. You pull me closer to you and encase me further within your arms and I realise that in this moment I feel safer than I have since you left all those months ago.

Gently you manoeuvre us to the sofa where I curl up against you, breathing in your warm, musky scent that I have missed so much. You begin to softly stroke my hair and the movement is so surprisingly gentle and so reminiscent of the old Remus Lupin who I fell in love with that I feel a glimmer of hope ignite deep within me.

"I've missed you" I murmur into your chest, my eyelids getting heavier and heavier. I hadn't realised how very tired I was until this moment and as my eyes slowly close I hear you reply ever so quietly, in hardly more than a whisper, "I've missed you too".

When I wake in the morning I find you are gone and for a moment I fear it may all have been a dream. I sit up and notice the bag containing a jumper from Molly on the floor which confirms that you really were here last night holding me and tendely stroking my hair as I fell asleep in your arms. Once again I feel a hope stir deep within me and as I remember the words you spoke to me I feel the tiny spark break into a huge flame.


	4. A terrible message

I do not see you again for a good few months, and in that time I cling to the hope that you awoke within me on that cold Christmas day. It is like a lifeline to me and I hold to it in the hope that when your dreadful mission finally ends you will still be the man I love with all my heart. That you will be salvageable, not broken beyond repair. But as the weeks pass and the only news of you I hear is that you are 'coping the best you can', I begin to fear that maybe my flame of hope is unfounded and the man I love is slowly being torn away from me. I feel physically sick at the thought and pray to whatever gods may be that you are given the strength you need to overcome this. It seems so incredibly unfair to me that after all the pain you have suffered, you have been asked once again to put your feelings aside and go through hell for the sake of others. I cannot help my resentment towards the man who sent you there and I find myself unable to look him in the eye whenever I see him.

As the sun rises following the April full moon, I go through my usual routine of sitting at the breakfast table, a cold cup of tea before me, trying to picture where you are and just what damage has been done to you this time around. But just as I reach for my wand to warm my tea an owl knocks on the window. Sighing I get up to let it in, my mind not prepared for the message that awaits me:

_Tonks,_

_Attack last night. Child dead. Please come to the Hogwarts infirmary as soon as possible – urgent._

_Moody_

As I read the message, I feel as though my heart has stopped and the air I am breathing is trapped in my lungs. It seems like the world has stopped for a split second and I struggle to think anything at all. Then all to soon the dam that was keeping my thoughts at bay breaks and I am flooded with worry. I flee straight out of the door and apparate to the gates of Hogwarts castle in a state of utter panic. It seems to take forever for me to reach the hallway leading to the hospital wing, but as I reach the door I find my feet have stopped moving and I cannot go in. Once again my mind is overwhelmed with thoughts – What if you're hurt or worse dead? What if it was you who attacked this child? I know you would never be the same then. You would be lost forever and for what?! I feel the familiar anger rise within me once again, pushing my fear for you to the side for a moment.

Finally I hear footsteps behind me and before I know it a warm hand is resting on my shoulder and a calm, familiar voice whispering in my ear.

"Go Nymphadora. He needs you, even if he is not willing enough to admit it"

I find the words soothe me and as I take the step forwards through the swing doors I close my eyes and pray that when they open you will be waiting there in one piece and a huge smile on your face and your arms open waiting for my embrace. Somehow though I know that this will not be the case.


	5. Utterly broken

Stepping into the ward I see curtains drawn around a bed at the far corner and as I slowly make my way across the hard, cold floor I feel my heart pounding in my chest and my breathing quicken. A fear unlike any I have ever felt before arises within me and it takes all my strength to stay on my quivering feet. After what feels like an absolute eternity I find myself a mere few metres away from the cubicle and my eyes are drawn for the first time away from the curtain and instead to the shape of a familiar figure sitting nearby. It is Moody and the look on his face only makes me worry all the more. Raising himself up onto two feet he comes to my side and as though reading my mind he begins to tell me the terrible story of what has happened.

He tells me how Greyback kidnapped the Montgomery's son moments before the Full Moon rose and how, despite your very best efforts, you were unable to save him from the horrific and savage beasts. He explains how you rose the alarm to the Order, risking your own life to do so and how by trying to protect the boy, Greyback turned his pack on you before turning on the child himself. He tells me how you were forced to watch as the beast began to maul the child, and how as the full moon rose you were rendered incapable of any more human thought and unable to provide the child with the assistance required to save his life.

As I listen to this horrifying tale it feels to me as though time has stopped and it is not until I hear the big door to the ward swing shut that I realise that Moody has left and it is only you and I left in the room. I begin to walk slowly to where I know you lie, not wanting my footsteps to break the eerie silence that surrounds us. Taking a deep breath I step around the curtains and find the air trapped in my lungs at the sight that I see.

You are lying on the bed before me, blood stained clothes covering your too thin body, and all the skin I can see is covered in bruises and scratches. Sensing my presence you slowly turn your head towards me and what I see shocks me more than anything I have ever seen. Your eyes show such pain that I find my own eyes swelling with tears and I realise that what has happened has ripped you to your very core.

Hearing the sound of rushed footsteps coming towards us I turn, breaking your gaze. It is Madame Pomfrey, her arms full with jars and bottles, no doubt containing all kinds of ointments and potions to aid in your recovery. I turn back to face you but before I have chance to say anything I find myself ushered out of the cubicle while the nurse tends to your wounds.

The wait is unbearable and I spend the time trying to think of what I can say to comfort you, to make you see that it is not your fault and to make you realise that I still love you more than anything. I think that if I can somehow find the perfect words then everything will be ok and I will have the man I love back. After what seems like an eternity, a very flustered Madame Pomfrey leaves your bedside. I wish I had the words to comfort her too but right now I lack the capability to think of anything but you.

I make my way back to your cubicle and this time as I step around the curtains I find that your wounds are healed and all that is left is patches of reddened skin. Once again you raise your head and as your eyes meet mine I realise for the first time exactly what the toils of the past six months and maybe more so, the last night, have done to you. You are a broken man. A man torn apart by the knowledge that despite your best efforts you were unable to save a small boy from the beasts that made you what you are. A man broken beyond repair because he feels he must prove to others and himself that he is not like them, that he is good. A man who in a short life has suffered so much and carried so much weight on his back, but for whom the weight has finally become too great. A man who despite fighting for so long simply cannot fight any longer. A man who I realise now, more clearly than ever, that I love with everything I am and who I hope more than anything that I can mend.

But it is also in this short moment of realisation that I come to see that there are no perfect words that I can use to fix this situation. In fact, there are no words that could ever come close to consoling you. What's done is done and no words could ever fix that. So instead I do the only thing I know for sure that I can do and to comfort you in the only way I know how.

I move closer towards you and as I do so you lean further away. Ignoring your attempt to push me away I continue to move closer and, as I finally reach your side, I reach my hand out to stroke your face. Once again you try to distance yourself from me and once again I choose to ignore your efforts. I perch myself next to you on the bed and fight you to pull you into my arms, whispering words of comfort and love into your hair. Eventually your efforts to distance yourself from me subside and I feel you give in to my embrace. Before long I feel small shudders rack through your body and then it is as though a dam has broken and everything you have been holding inside surges out in one quick flurry.

Seeing and feeling you break so suddenly is such a shock to me that I find myself struggling not to break down with you. I have wanted for so long to hold you in my arms but now that I am I find myself willing to give or do anything for this moment not to have happened. It hurts me so much to see the man that I love in such gut-wrenching agony that I can do nothing to ease and it hurts me even more to see you so completely and utterly broken. You have been destroyed by the burdens you have born and you are here before me shattered into a million pieces. For the first time since that day you left me I find myself feeling completely and utterly uncertain at what will become of us. I don't know if you can ever recover from this moment. You have seen too much and lost too many people who you love. You are completely and utterly broken.


	6. A matter of trust and love

Over the next couple of hours I just hold you. I don't know if you're asleep or just so completely shattered – emotionally and physically – that you are unable to move, but whatever it is I find myself glad that it is me who is with you.

Somehow the fact that you choose to share these most intimate moments with me causes my heart to swell. In all those months we dated and shared a bed you never once let me see you like this – never let me see you so raw, so truly naked. There were walls built around you. Walls so high and strong that noone could penetrate them. But now, now I feel as though you have let me in. You have finally let me in through the door and allowed me to see the broken pieces of your soul. And whatsmore, you have trusted me enough to not only see those fragmented pieces, but to comfort you and try to mend them.

The hope this gives me is insurmountable. I mean, I know that whatever happens next isn't going to be simple. I know that right now you feel broken beyond repair. But it seems to me as though through this terrible experience we have moved on in our relationship. The relationship between us has evolved into something far more even and substantial. It seems as though for the first time since the day I met you, you are trusting me as explicitly as I do you and the mere fact that you have allowed me to be here with you now, when you are at your most vulnerable, tells me that you do still love me. And that despite all the toils and heartbreak the last year has brought us, the happy ending I have dreamed of every night may not be that far away. For trust is not something you give away lightly, and the knowledge that you do trust me and that you still love me lifts me higher than ever.


	7. Shattered again

I don't see or hear from you again for almost two weeks and when I do I wish I begin to wish I haven't. Dumbledore has kept me busy with various small jobs and though I have written to you at least three times you have not replied, which is why when a rugged owl appears at the window my heart leaps and I dash to retrieve the letter I just know you have sent.

Upon seeing your tidy scrawl on the outside my heart soars even higher only to drop to the ground when I read what you have written:

_Nymphadora,_

_I appreciate your concern for me over these past weeks but I am writing to ask you to give me the space and time we both need to adjust. As you are well aware I have spent a large part of the last year trying desperately to distance you from me and even though my failed mission has come to an end I think it best for us to maintain that distance. If this year has taught me anything it is that my kind are far too dangerous for you to waste your life on. I know what you're argument to this will be but the fact of the matter is that I am far too old, too poor and too dangerous for you and the sooner you come to realise this the happier we both will be._

_I am so sorry if I have given you reason to think otherwise, but deep down we both know this is for the best. I wish for you to move on Dora, and that means you must forget about me._

_Sorry,_

_Remus J Lupin_

As I read your words I feel my eyes stinging slightly as tears begin to form. Of all the replies I had imagined you writing, this was not one of them. I thought that we had reached a new intimacy in our relationship, one that we could build on to make our relationship stronger than before you left. But now I find those thoughts have been knocked to the ground and I feel so hopeless I am lost for both words and actions. I fall back against the wall, my shoulders leaning heavily against it.

For the last year I have craved you, I have longed to feel your touch and to taste your kiss. And for the last year it has seemed that those things have been an insurmountable distance away, that is until that night two weeks ago. I know that I should not take such hope from a time when you were in such utter anguish and turmoil, but that night something between us shifted. For the first time ever you were dependent on me and that gave me hope. It made it seem us though the touch from you that I have needed for so long was finally within reach. But now, now it feels as though you are being dragged away from me once again at a speed which I cannot possibly match.

The words you have spoken in that letter shock me. You say that you are too poor and old and dangerous and it angers me. How can you think that such materialistic things bother me? How is it you can possibly believe that you are too dangerous? You are the most gentle, kind and amazing person I have ever known and it is because of that that I love you more than I ever imagined I could.

The pain I feel at this moment in time is something I cannot describe. I feel empty and cold and hurt all at the same time. I do not know what to do. How can I get on with my life without you? For almost a year you were the reason I got up in the morning. You gave me meaning. And now you are asking me to leave that behind. You want me to forget about all those nights we spent together and all those kisses we shared. You want me to forget about the way you would always wait for me to fall asleep before you would even contemplate closing your eyes, and how after a long shift at work you would always be waiting for me with a hot chocolate, ready to hear about my day. How can I do that? I wish I could but I just can't. I love you too much for that.

I slump down the wall and hug my legs in towards my chest. The tears fall from my eyes and I make no attempt to stop them. That night when I held you as you cried something changed between us. How could it not? You had never shown me that side of you. You had never been so vulnerable. And while I thought it was for the good it appears you think otherwise. It has been over 9 months since the day you first left me and broke my heart and now I find my heart shattered once again.


	8. This is it

How on earth did we end up here? That's all I can think as we continue to patrol the dark corridors of Hogwarts, in complete and utter silence. I know Dumbledore wanted extra protection tonight, though I'm not entirely sure why, but was this really necessary? We've been here forty-five minutes and forty-four of those minutes have been filled by the most irritatingly painful silence I have ever experienced - a silence which, is occupied by so many unsaid things that it is quite frankly painful for me to be here. For I have a thousand and one things I would love more than anything to tell you, but I know that now is not the time or the place. I vowed to myself to give you the space you need and so be it. If in staying away from you I can help you return to your former, post-mission-self then it is the least I can do.

But this is a lot harder to put into practice than it would seem. We walk along quite quickly and every now and then I sneak a glance at you and I can sense that you are doing the same. You no longer appear to be painfully thin, and while your face is still covered by a somewhat figurative shadow of gloom. There seems to be more life than the last time I saw you and I find myself breathing that little bit easier as you are seeming to be recovering.

"Remus.."

"Not now Nymphadora"

I want to yell at you for using the name that noone but you dare to speak, but the words don't form on my tongue and I know that it is useless. For there is something about the way you say it, the way your voice softens, that makes a shiver run through me every time. I can't put my finger on it exactly, but when you speak my name – the name I have loathed for as long as I can remember – it feels different.

We come to a staircase and you speak the first proper sentence you have said to me since our somewhat awkward and strained greeting one hour earlier.

"Why don't you stick to this corridor and patrol round by the classrooms and I'll check the upper corridors?" You phrase it as a question but I know it is not. It is another of your ridiculous attempts to protect me and I have had enough. If you wish to continue to deny your love for me then you have no right to safeguard me.

"I'm more than capable of doing the upper corridors myself. How about you stay down here and I will check upstairs?"And with that I turn away from you and, being careful not to trip, make my way swiftly up the staircase. I do not turn to see the expression on your face but I know you well enough to know that my words will have burned you ever so slightly and I'm glad. However, your next move is not one I would have predicted. I had expected you to obey my instructions and take the opportunity I had given you to put some space between us, but that is not what you do. Instead I hear the quiet patter of your feet on the ground as you follow me upstairs.

When we reach the top you quickly catch me up and once again we are walking side by side in utter silence. However this time it feels different and I realise I don't want to spend this evening in silence. I want to talk to you, to find out how you really are, to find out why Dumbledore sent you of all people to the castle tonight, to just chat to you like we used to before all of this happened. But before I get the chance we are disturbed by the sound of running feet coming towards us from around the corner. We both instantly halt and I grasp my wand tightly in my hand, noticing out of the corner of my eye that you have done the same. However, it seems our panic premature - it's Hermione and Luna shouting something about death eaters and the Room of Requirement. I take one quick glance at you and meet your eye. Your gaze is strong and what it conveys is stronger. I see panic, fear, excitement and anticipation. But beneath all that I see a tiny glimmer of fear and I understand why. This is it. This is why Dumbledore wanted us here. Probably why he paired Remus and I together on this night. The war has really hit and lives are at stake. People will fall and friends of both mine and yours will be lost. So as we dash after the girls I can only hope that you are not one of those who we are to lose, and that you will remain whole.


End file.
